Secondary School visit to Faculty of EducationForum for Youth Participation and Democracy

Welcome

Welcome to the Forum for Youth Participation & Democracy, established to draw together practitioners, young people, policy makers, and researchers from Cambridge University and around the world to explore the problem of youth exclusion in decision-making, and the implications for democracy. We are particularly concerned with the inter-related barriers of:

• Inadequate support for young people to participate in public decision making;
• Growing socio-economic marginalisation of the young;
• Persistent discrimination on the grounds of gender, race or belief;
• The anti-democratic impact of cultural outlook such as market individualism & traditionalist fundamentalism.

Get Involved

You can become involved with the Forum by contributing to our Comments section; sharing with us information about any relevant Research you are engaged in; or letting us know about related News & Events. (contact: Dr. Henry Tam, hbt21@cam.ac.uk). 

The Challenges We Face

(Henry Benedict Tam, the Forum's Director, gives his views on current challenges)

May 2012

If society is not to be divided between those so powerful they can trample over others’ wellbeing and those unable to defend their own interests, then true democracy must prevail. We would need more than an electoral system dominated by the influence of the wealthy. What is required is a socio-political structure that enables all citizens to engage in cooperative problem-solving at their workplace, in their local communities, and through their national government. In partnership with others who share our concern in improving understanding of how democratic decision-making can function without plutocratic distortions, the Forum will be focusing on research that specifically supports the expansion of cooperative problem-solving in different spheres of life. Democracy can only be sustained if citizens continuously learn to come together for the sake of their common good. Should they forget those lessons, they would inevitably fall prey to oppression (see ‘The Case for Cooperative Problem-Solving’).

April 2012

Does the freedom of a politician to present his party’s disingenuous policies trump the freedom of a concerned citizen to express his objection, in prose or otherwise? Such issues are about contested claims regarding harm being done, and they can only be settled with reference to how the evidence in any given case stacks up in the judgement of our peers. Imagine a politician had spoken to a university audience about the way Jews had according to him exaggerated the “minor inconvenience” they experienced in the 1930s and 1940s. Would we not wish for someone to interrupt him, robustly? Or conversely, if a minister’s presentation on climate change is interrupted by a student repeatedly claiming that climate change is solely down to God punishing gay people, would we not want to see a swift end to that interruption? In short, whether anyone’s speech should flow freely without interruption cannot be judged in isolation from the reasonableness of the claims and counter-claims involved. To slap a stringent punishment against an interruption irrespective of the context bears a hint of irrationality at best, and authoritarian excess at worst. (see ‘The Free Speech Conundrum’)

March 2012

Should democratic cooperation be taught to everyone? Should all citizens at school, in their community, at the workplace, and in the public domain, learn how to resolve their differences and collaborate on the basis that everyone has an equal say in the decisions that affect them? While some of us may wonder how the inculcation of such a reasonable outlook could be met with anything other than a warm welcome, the reality is that some powerful voices are against the very notion that people should help each other formulate and pursue common goals on equal terms. On the one hand, authoritarians of different hues demand to see their preferred faith, doctrine, or elite agenda command the obedience of all regardless of individual objections. On the other hand, relativist intellectuals proclaim with absolute certainty that there is no such thing as objective truth that can be invoked to resolve conflicting views. But unless we promote better learning of the techniques and benefits of democratic cooperation, and keep at bay both the authoritarians and the relativists, we would end up being mired in irreconcilable disputes and social fragmentation. (See ‘Much Ado About Cooperating’).

February 2012

Imagine a political leader who has ordered firewood to be scattered across the city, publicly defended the right of arsonists to be paid bonuses for their hard work, froze the pay of firefighters, and cut funding for fire engines. When fire breaks out across the city, he blames the firefighters for coasting along and not doing enough. Well, having scattered the firewood of widening inequalities everywhere, our Cabinet of Millionaires have decided that every time there is a report on disadvantaged children doing less well in school examinations, they will pile the blame on teachers and heads of schools. They have ushered in the age of Premier League Education, where concentrated wealth is celebrated for buying success in winning A* trophies and much besides. For schools in poor areas, they just have to keep living under the threat of relegation to a lower status which brings stigmitisation and even more funding cuts. Of course there are teachers and heads who need to improve, but not half as much as political leaders who think the slope of a plutocratic pyramid will do as a level playing field (see ‘Welcome to the Premier League of Education’).

January 2012

Many people, including the Archbishop of Canterbury, are concerned that memories of the summer riots, especially TV footage of “young people out of control in the streets, walking off with looted property from shops, noisily confronting police and so on," would lead to the public demonising young people. In fact, in the ICM poll carried out on behalf of Barnado’s in November 2011, 44% of respondents believed young people were becoming feral in their behaviour. Presumably these people also believe that all adults were becoming utterly selfish and irresponsible because a small minority of adults (in the finance sector) behaved abominably in recent years, completely out of control in the board room, walking off with other people’s money, nosily demanding public funds to line their own pocket. Unfortunately, some politicians will exploit such misconception and call for even more fodder education, or schooling that will ‘domesticate’ young minds into docile workers to serve plutocratic masters. But what we really need is not mindless fodder, but thoughtful citizens (see ‘Educating Fodder’)

December 2011

From the activists of Cambridge Defend Education to workers who’re losing out on pay and pension, from families being pushed into poverty to small businesses squeezed by excessive cuts, citizens are confronted by a system which, despite its formal democratic structure, appears to marginalise the majority in favour of the wealthy minority. The latest measures by the UK Government bring in more cuts that hit the poorest over 5 times as hard they do the richest (Resolution Foundation). The rich continue to receive huge subsidies for land they own, while the number of affordable homes built for the less well-off has been cut from 12,482 (April-Sept 2010) to just 454 (April-Sept 2011). The Government’s response to the nearly £100 billion of tax evaded/avoided is to cut 12,000 more tax collectors. So is democracy ineffectual? Is society fated to serve the interests of the corporate elite? Ultimately it depends on how we make our democratic voices count. The Forum will be focusing in 2012 on what form of participation can best bring about a more inclusive society. (See ‘Can Democracy Be Saved?’)

November 2011

For centuries the primitive outlook of leaving young people (except for those born into a very wealthy family) to fend for themselves held sway. Little education, no protection for working in treacherous conditions, and no safety net if they ever became too ill, too old or just too out of luck to get any paid work. The 20th century was supposed to have changed all that. But the old callousness is making a rapid return under the guise of a most dubious economic doctrine. Instead of pooling resources, nationally and globally, to enable young people to have a sustainable future, the new priorities are to cut support for the young in every sphere of life and hand the savings to the financiers so they can keep growing richer. We would like to see researchers speak up and challenge the worldwide policies which are stripping the next generation of all hope of attaining a better quality of life. If you are playing an active part already, let us know about your work.

October 2011

If there is one thing young people should know about politics, it is that there are those who want to cultivate total cynicism amongst them so they would stay away from electoral politics. The ploy is simple enough: dismantle public services so they appear as inadequate, jettison pledges so politicians who appear to care end up looking utterly untrustworthy, and put the blame on scapegoats so people overlook the unfair policies which help those with the most at the expense of those with the least. If you don’t rally behind political action, those who count on your apathy win. Young people must make sure their peers are not deflected from electoral politics. Protests, marches, sit-ins etc can only take you so far. There are policies which are fairer, stand up to vested corporate interests, responsive to people’s needs irrespective of the size of their bank account, and deliver improvements for all and not just for the few. Work with those who have these as part of their political platform and win the necessary elections. ‘Nothing will change for the better’ can be the most destructive self-fulfilling prophecy.

September 2011

Where is the youth impact assessment on government policies? Under the catch-all banner of deficit reduction, the government has cut out numerous forms of support for young people, burden them with increased costs to enter higher education, and remove investment in the public sector which undermines the employment prospect of school leavers and graduates. The costs to the affected young people and the wider society are likely to be far higher than the short term savings. Moreover, whatever the political reason for requiring young people with the smallest share of the nation’s wealth to contribute disproportionately to dealing with the fallout of the irresponsible behaviour of the banking sector, it is alarming that there is no sign of any concern with developing a proper public investment plan for future generations. If politicians want young people to be engaged in public policy debates, they should start addressing what they are prepared to do for those growing up with the gravest uncertainties since the 1940s.

August 2011

Sadly the urgency for critical understanding of youth policies has escalated with the riots across England this summer. As usual, knee-jerk reaction from some commentators and politicians has shown how ill-thought responses could exacerbate rather than repair the damages to society. There are at least three sets of issues which demand informed consideration. First, what should be done about that tiny but highly problematic minority of young people who have no respect for the wellbeing of their neighbours or the wider community? Secondly, what policy changes should be brought in to avert the social and economic marginalisation of vast numbers of young people? Just because they remain law-abiding, it does not mean the government should ignore the pressing need to remove the many demoralising barriers now placed before young people in getting a university education, a job, a place to live, and a chance to escape dire economic insecurity. Finally, what socio-economic reforms must be introduced to end the hypocrisy of encouraging the rich and powerful to do as they please while condemning the young and dispossessed who follow their example? Why should the poor be evicted if they cannot stop the criminal behaviour of their child, but the rich should be able to not pay their taxes and be rewarded by being told that those taxes would be scrapped?

July 2011

The UN General Assembly is to hold a high-level meeting with theme of ‘Youth: Dialogue and Mutual Understanding’ on 25 and 26 July 2011, as part of its International Year of Youth. It will be examining how to strengthen “international cooperation regarding youth and enhancing dialogue, mutual understanding and active youth participation as indispensable elements towards achieving social integration, full employment and the eradication of poverty”; and how to tackle the “challenges to youth development and opportunities for poverty eradication, employment and sustainable development.” 25 years on from the first International Year of Youth back in 1985, the need for effective policies to give young people a real say in dealing with the global changes that impact on them is greater than ever. The University of Cambridge has agreed to set up the Forum for Youth Participation and Democracy to promote the exchange of ideas to help meet this need. We look forward to working with colleagues across the world to contribute to the development of better thinking for the future.